Brittany Mathews, North Carolina - IDF Teen and Young Adult Council Member

My story begins on October 12, 1989 - that’s the day that I was born. My mom and dad were like any other parents and all they hoped for was a healthy baby girl, but from birth, it was obvious that I was not your typical baby girl. My mom quickly noticed after the doctors handed me to her that she couldn’t put her finger in my hand like she had done with my brothers when they were born. She looked closer and saw that my fingers were webbed together on both of my hands. My parents handled this very well and they looked forward to the day when surgery would correct this. Then, my mom noticed that I was not eating properly. That’s when doctors found out that my medical condition was a bit more severe and that I also had a cleft palate.

When I was 13 months old, I was scheduled for the operation to separate the webbing on my hands. Just as I was headed into surgery, my health declined very quickly and I was rushed to another hospital immediately. The doctors and nurses were shocked to find that my Hemoglobin, Platelets and White Counts were the lowest that they had ever seen! I was jaundiced and weak and had to be transported by emergency medical crews to the hospital where it took nearly a month for doctors to come to a diagnosis. Although I did not really fit into any group, the closet thing they could agree upon was an extremely rare autoimmune disorder called Evans Syndrome. I was given 30 days to live from the day of my diagnosis in November of 1990.

Clearly, the doctor’s calculations were slightly off and thank goodness they were! I spent the majority of my infant, toddler and childhood years in the hospital and received high doses of steroids practically all of my life. I would get pneumonia at least 3 times a year and my lungs would get weaker with every episode. At the age of ten, I was vomiting frequently and was unable to receive any relief. I finally went to see a gastroenterologist who ran some lab work. After receiving the lab results, he came to my mother and said, “Mrs. Mathews, do you know that your daughter has no immune levels?” Three weeks, five doctors and twenty tests later and we had an answer to my mystery vomiting! A week after I was released from the hospital I was seen by an immunologist who finally diagnosed me with Common Variable Immune Deficiency and ITP.

Today, I am happy to say that after all of that, I am a college student entering my sophomore year majoring in communications and recreational therapy.

I am very active in volunteering with special needs groups and love horses. I have also become very involved with IDF and it truly has been the best experience of my life, so far. For the first time ever, I feel like I am not alone and I am being given the opportunity to use my story to educate the public about primary immune deficiencies and put a face to PIDD.

I have a very active, crazy schedule, but there is one thing that always takes precedence over everything - the life saving immunoglobulin infusions I receive every three weeks. I would not be able to go to school, be around people or live my life without the amazing donors who give me my life back by donating plasma to produce immunoglobulin!